Dan Halter
Current Review(s)
Double Entry
Dan Halter at Whatiftheworld/gallery‘Double Entry’, Dan Halter’s latest solo exhibition, examines twin themes. The privations and misery that impel Zimbabweans to quit their own country in search of a better life, the dangers they face crossing the border, and the xenophobic violence and economic exploitation that await them in the host country is one. The other is the shameful posturing of both the South African and ZANU PF governments whose empty promises have failed to alleviate the violation of human rights, poverty, hunger and desperation that prevails in Zimbabwe.
V.I.P. Border, the installation that greets us on entry, creates a powerful first impression. Ropes fashioned from red velvet yarn, exactly the same length as the border between the two countries, cordon the gallery off into narrow walkways, like those conducting weary passengers to customs and immigration at airports.
07 July 2010 - 14 August 2010
Listings(s)
'Shifting the Goalposts'
Dan Halter at Son Gallery‘Shifting the Goalposts’ is a photographic project based around the Beitbridge border between Zimbabwe and South Africa, a location notorious for illegal immigration. Those coming into South Africa are often met with harsh and xenophobic conditions upon arrival. Halter switched a set of goalposts from a football pitch in the deprived Musina South Africa for a set of goalposts from another pitch in Beitbridge Zimbabwe, subtly politicising both pitches which now each have local and foreign goalposts.
The recently-opened Son Gallery provides a sustainable platform for photography-inspired artists, and would like to thank whatiftheworld/gallery in Cape Town and the Goethe Institute for their support in creating this exhibition.
04 June 2010 - 04 July 2010
'Double Entry'
Dan Halter at Whatiftheworld/galleryDan Halter's new exhibition extends and develops his work on the subject of Zimbabwe. Drawing on two field trips to the Beitbridge border post, the show focuses particularly on Zimbabwean immigrants, and their fraught and often dangerous journey into South Africa. Halter is also concerned with the xenophobic violence these immigrants have suffered at the hands of local South Africans, and more broadly the relations between the two neighbouring countries, seeking to interrogate empty promises made by governments on both sides. Infused with Halter's dark sense of humor, this exhibition includes video, print and installation work relating to these issues.
Exhibition opens: 18h00, Wed 07 July
NO ENTRY WITHOUT A VALID PASSPORT
07 July 2010 - 14 August 2010
'The Truth Lies Here'
Dan Halter at Whatiftheworld/gallery'The Truth Lies Here' is Dan Halter’s fourth solo exhibition. The show engages with notions of transmigration, the construction of ‘truths’, and the way in which things hold together and fall apart – the integration and disintegration of the fabric of the Zimbabwean Diaspora.
fab•ri•cate (verb)
1. to make, build, or construct
2. to devise, invent, or concoct (a story, lie, etc.)
3. to fake or forge
08 March 2012 - 14 April 2012
'Propaganda by Monuments'
Dan Halter, Hasan and Husain Essop and Angela Ferreira at Contemporary Image Collective, Cairo'Calling all enterprising businessmen! The import opportunity of a lifetime presents itself. The Moscow City Council has decided to dismantle the hundreds of monuments to Vladimir Illyich Lenin which grace its crowded public buildings and empty market-places. Cities throughout the crumbling Soviet Union will follow suit. We ask you: where else in the world is there a ready market for statues of Lenin but in South Africa? Jump right in before the local comrades snap them up for nothing.' From Propaganda by Monuments by Ivan Vladislavic, 1996
As the structures of modern regimes are gutted and one society’s implication with another is reassessed, the idea of renaissance carries with it more than its weight in bronze. The exhibition 'Propaganda by Monuments' seeks to reassess nostalgia as a globalised process; less as a helplessly melancholic reconstruction of an idealised moment, and more of a recasting and importation of desired ideologies and material residue. Invoking a ceaseless economy of change and reconstruction, the work of eight artists presented together with a programme of screenings and discussions, use a variety of reflective, dynamic tools to collect and refashion ideals – confronting us with the shifting sands beneath monumental pedestals.
Curated by Clare Butcher and Mia Jankowicz, with catalogue texts by Amy Halliday and Ivan Vladislavic, in English and Arabic.
30 January 2011 - 26 February 2011
'Mappa del Mondo'
Dan Halter at NKV: Nassauischer KunstvereinAs part of the NKVextra programme, the NKV Kunstverein Wiesbaden shows two artists addressing modern migration movements in different ways. The film Exodus by Almagul Menlibayeva (Kazakhstan) is the portrait of a broken culture caught between age-old traditions and a globalized presence, charting the departure of nomads as a simultaneously sad and hopeful event. Dan Halter's (Zimbabwe) works refer to the individual dimension of each migration movement. Using everyday materials and techniques in a playful way, Halter uncovers oppressive conditions which force people to leave their home. The NKV presents three of his works in a cabinet exhibition.
06 November 2011 - 18 December 2011
